Still Painting Flowers for You
by Unexplainable Contradiction
Summary: At school, Percy ends up having to write about his best and worst days, and then he has to read what he wrote. Out loud. As it turns out, both revolve around the same little girl, the one who is missing. The one who loved flowers. The one he still paints flowers for./Not Percabeth! Sort of depressing. Very dark. For people who have read my stories, especially Apples.


**Yay! Another little thing I wrote on my iPod. This takes place when Percy is in eighth grade, before ****_The Titan's Curse_****, so he is fourteen; and it is better for people who read my story_ Apples _to read this.**

**This was inspired by All Time Low's song Painting Flowers, which I do not own.**

**_WARNING: DARK. SERIOUSLY DARK._**

**I AM A FEMALE ON FANFICTION. I DO NOT OWN.**

Still Painting Flowers for You

**_Percy Jackson's POV_**

Staring at the prompt, I felt my stomach lurch. Mr. Brown, my English teacher, had given all of his students a composition notebook for journal entries. Each time he gave a prompt, something we students had to write about, it was different. On the first day of school, the day we all got our journals, the prompt was about friends: What is a friend? Who do you think a good friend is? Give examples of different friends you have.

It had been simple enough for me, and it was easily done. These weren't graded anyways, except if you read aloud to the class. Then they were graded, and, if they were good enough, read to all of the English classes.

But that was the thing: everyone had to read to the class at least once, and each time two to four people read. Now there was only one person left who hadn't read in class, and that person was me.

I would've read for any other day, even the most embarrassing moment of my life or one of my deepest secrets. I didn't read though, and now I had to read today.

I stared at the prompt as I made sure my dyslexia wasn't acting up on me. It wasn't.

_Between ages of four and ten, choose the best and worst days of your life. Why? Be truthful and show us that you mean it._

I already knew my answer-I had known for years-but it was personal. Very personal. My hand shook, my pencil clacking against the paper as I thought about them-my best and worst days.

Maybe I could convince Mr. Brown to let me read for all of the other prompts. Then I could safe myself from a world of pain. After, I told myself. I'll ask after I write my paper.

My pencil scratched against the paper, and slowly but surely words, sentences, and paragraphs formed in between the lines of my paper.

_Painting Flowers_ was my tittle.

* * *

"Mister Jackson, please go to the front of the room," Mr. Brown said to me, waving his arm.

"Ummm... Mr. Brown, could I not read this to the class?" I asked, feeling my face flush as the students around me snickered at my question.

"Mr. Jackson, everyone else read to the classroom. I don't see why you can't." Mr. Brown raised one eyebrow carefully, like he was already ready to blow down my hopes and dreams.

"I will read to the classroom, sir, but I was hoping to read something else." I turned up my manners, praying that he would ask what I could possibly read.

"What else could you possibly read?" he asked, and I felt my sense of hope swell.

"All of my other journal entries," I deadpanned. "Even the ones after this."

Mr. Brown raised both of his eyebrows in surprise. "You make quite a bargain, Mr. Jackson, but, I'm afraid, since you waited to be last, you must read today."

I about fell to my knees to pray to him like a god. I didn't though; but I did continue to bargain, even if I was horrible with words. "But it's very personal, Mr. Brown," I attempted to guilt him. "I really don't want to share this with the class."

"Oh, is that it? I figured you just didn't write anything. This is a very difficult prompt." Mr. Brown's hands were flat on his desk.

"No, I wrote. I wrote much more than needed page, actually, but it's personal. I don't want to read," I countered his accusation.

"So it's just personal, hmmm? Well, I'll be the judge of that." He clapped his thin, piano hands together. "Mister Jackson, to the front please, unless you want a zero for a test grade."

I grimaced, but slowly stood from my creaking desk. Shuffling my feet to delay the inevitable, I made my way to the front of the room. There, I turned on my heels to face the bored room. Many students were sleeping and the other majority weren't even paying attention, so I had more hope that no one would process everything I was going to say.

I had poured my heart into this paper.

_"Painting Flowers,"_ I read quietly.

"Louder, Mr. Jackson," Mr. Brown ordered.

_"Painting Flowers,"_ I read, louder.

Mr. Brown nodded for me to continue, approving my tittle.

_"To anyone else, my best day between the ages of four and ten won't seem like much, but it's everything to me. I don't mean to sound like an ingrate, but my past isn't what most would call the best, especially for a kid. That is probably why this memory means so much to me, why it sticks out so much."  
_  
I sucked in a deep, shuddering breath of air.

_"My best day was when I was five. See, when I was_ _five, I had this best friend"_—I paused—_"my twin sister, Panthea Madison Jackson, born August 18th, 1994, twenty-four seconds before me. She was—still is, actually—my best friend, and she is absolutely obsessed with flowers. Nobody knew why she was obsessed, but people guessed it was because we lived in an area with few flowers. People let it be though, so every time she saw a flower, she would pick it for her collection. When we would get home, Panthea would press the flower in our mom's big dictionary and then paint a copy of it later. Afterward, both the pressed flower and painting would be tacked to our walls_.

_"There were dozens, and I mean dozens upon dozens of flowers, but Panthea, having looked up information on flowers, wanted to have one copy of each flower in the world-which, as we all know, is quite irrational. She was persistent though, enough to where she would sneak into people's gardens to snatch flowers she didn't have.  
_  
_"When she was at a standstill with finding her flowers, Panthea, with my help, would write down the name and scientific name of all the flowers she had. Together I'm pretty sure we named over a hundred different flowers, memorizing all of them, and—need I remind you—we were five, nearing six.  
_  
_"At one point, we had named all of the flowers she had. That was when my wonderful mother decided to take us out for a little trip. That was the beginning of my best day._

_"Truthfully, I couldn't say where the place is, but I'll remember that day forever." _

I looked up for a moment as I breathed to steady my fluttering heart. Surprisingly, students were listening intently at me, only a few boys in the back snickering at the flowers part.

"Mr. Jackson," my English teacher interrupted my thoughts, "are you going to continue?"

I nodded mutely._ "Our mom took us to a park somewhere out in some country-ish area. There were literally flowers everywhere. Fields of yellow and pink and red and orange splattered the grassy hills, like something from a movie. Panthea had dragged me down to them, and we spent the whole entire day together playing and picking flowers in those fields_.

_"I can still remember that day like it was yesterday, and I wouldn't change it as one of the best days of my life for the world_,_" _I finished, the first section of my paper now read.

_"The worst day of my life between the ages of four and ten is actually the worst day of my life, ever. I even titled it_ The Worst Day of My Life,_"_ I began. _"What happened on that day, well, I won't go into specifics._ _I will not even be detailed on what happened afterwards."_

Some people laughed—out loud, may I add—at my dramatics, but I glared at them in return.

_"I'll start with the after effects, to give a vague idea of how bad_ The Worst Day of My Life _is._ _Basically, I guess people would say, I lost it. I was diagnosed with depression, PTSD or Post Traumatic Stress Disorder, and insanity—certified and all." _

I looked up to see my fellow students all staring at me, most as if I were lying. I didn't care, though. All I had to do was read what I wrote. If they didn't believe, that was on them.

_"Depression is a somewhat common thing, but I don't think it's natural for six-year-olds to get it. PTSD is somewhat common too, for older people, but, again, not for depressed six year-olds. But the insanity was the worst part. It ruined my life. My neighbors were threatening to call the police every second of every day. News casters were constantly asking to interview me, the crazed—well, that's for later. Even my therapist said I was crazy, and he even brought me to an asylum to show me my new home_.

_"But that's not the worst of_ _it_._"_

I looked up again, to see all their confused faces. One kid mouthed to herself, That's not the worst of it?

_"On_ The Worst Day of My Life, _I was accused for the murder of my twin sister_._" _

My hands were shaking by now, crumpling the edges of my paper.

_"I don't know what the police were thinking. How could a six-year-old kid, who loved his sister like there was no tomorrow, murder her ruthlessly, then hide the body? It didn't make sense. Still doesn't. But I was questioned and brought to court. I defended myself as not guilty, even going as far to prove it by saying every little detail I could manage without going into a panic attack, and my attempts helped_.

_"Somewhat_._"_ I took in a deep breath to calm my nerves.

_"I was not proven guilty nor not guilty, and to this day, it's still an unfinished case. Either way, I'm still certified, even if I'm allowed to stay with the 'normal' people as long as I take my meds and try not to mess with anyone's head_.

_"I'm going to skip the specifics on the actually crime and go to my conclusion, because I don't think a detailed description of a so-called murder will go smoothly with the school, spoken or not._

_"Anyway, my conclusion. Both my best and worst times circled on my twin sister, Panthea Madison Jackson, the flower obsessed girl who was my companion through thick and thin. The girl whose collection is growing now, even though she has been missing for over eight years_._"_

I grinned slightly at my last part. This was my way of spreading my word.

_"Oh, and a little note for those idiots who claimed her dead: she isn't dead. I will repeat that over and over, no matter how mentally unstable that makes me seem. Besides, it's not like she can be proven dead. There is no body_.

_"And my letter for my twin, because I know she is out there, somewhere, somehow: Panthea Madison Jackson, my crazy yet lovable sister, don't you worry. I am still painting flowers for you."  
_  
"Fine."

* * *

The next day, while I was walking to my English class, two girls with tears in their eyes walked up to me. I didn't have any clue as to why, because I did not know who they were. For a moment I thought I was simply imagining that they were heading in my direction, but that ended when they both gripped one of my arms, their nails digging into my flesh.

The brunette waved her manicured hand in front of her face. "That is just so sweet!" she cried, more tears pooling into the tips of her hazel eyes.

"Ummm... Excuse me?" I asked, still thoroughly confused.

The blonde to my left sniffled loudly and wiped her eyes by putting her face on my sleeve. "That you're still painting flowers for her!"

I gulped. "W-what?"

"The composition you wrote for Mr. Brown. Gosh! I was nearly sobbing my heart out just during the first part!" the brunette screamed in my ear.

"Yeah," the blonde added. "I can't imagine the horrible stuff you had to go through. And when you were six! That's just asking too much!"

"Uh huh." I was feeling dizzy, the world tilting all around me. My teacher was reading my journal entry to all of his classes? "I have to... ummm... get to class. Yeah, um, bye." With that, I yanked my arms from their grasps and rushed down the hall, only barely making it into the room before the bell rang.

I veered to my right immediately, heading toward my teacher's desk. "Mr. Brown," I said lowly, so only he could hear. "Why are you reading something I specifically said was very private to all of your classes?"

He raised his eyes, like he was questioning why I seemed so angry. "It is a spectacular piece of work, your very best. Though, you did have many grammatical errors."

I rolled my eyes. "Yeah, and most people think I made it up."

"Actually"—Mr. Brown laced his fingers together—"I called your mother last night, and she told me that all you said was true, that I could even go back to find newspapers and news reports on you if I looked. And you know, I did. I found news articles all on that awful day. I even watched a rerun of a news report on you."

"Then why are you reading it to the whole school?" I asked angrily.

His forehead creased as he raised his brows even further. "I always read the best journal entry to all of my classes." I winced. I couldn't exactly fight that, because I knew it was true. "Now, Mr. Jackson, I think you should go to your seat." My shoulders sagged just a bit as I dragged my feet to my desk in the back of the room.

"Today class," Mr. Brown announced to the room, "we will be discussing the journal entry of your fellow student Mr. Jackson." Girls and guys alike swiveled in their seat to get a good look at me. "Now, I know what he wrote doesn't exactly seem real, but, trust me, I did my research and it's all real."

Staring eyes and silence fill the classroom.

"I'll start with my input of what I think," Mr. Brown continued. "Perseus and Panthea Jackson are twins and the best of friends. Panthea, though, had what you may call an obsession, an obsession with flowers, but Percy helped her collect her flowers and press and paint them. Because that's what it was all about—pressing and painting flowers..."

**Eh, not my best work. Make me feel better with some reviews, guys, please. I was really wary to post this. **

**Dark right? Percy convicted of murder, at the mere age of six? Yeah, well, _some of_ _the_ _police officers were monsters_—just to say. **

**Journal entry is about 840 words. Whoop! But I didn't go into much detail, because, well, it's Percy, and even in my stories he can be blunt and oblivious. **

**Anyway… do whatever. **

**Peace and all that other stuff.**

**~XxxXGreek GeekXxxX **


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